Commentary

Top 10 Moments That Mattered to Jews in 5777

by Josefin Dolsten, JTA | Sep 17, 2017 | Commentary, National, News

NEW YORK (JTA) — This Jewish year was not a quiet one, to say the least. From the tumultuous first eight months of Donald Trump’s presidency, to a wave of bomb threats against Jewish community centers, to a neo-Nazi protest in Charlottesville that turned...

Should NYC Remove Statues of its Anti-Semitic Dutch Governor?

by Ben Sales, JTA | Aug 23, 2017 | Commentary, National, National Politics, News, OP/ED

(JTA) — Robert E. Lee, Jefferson Davis, Stonewall Jackson … and Peter Stuyvesant? One of these things is not like the others. Amid the impassioned debate over whether, when and how to remove statues memorializing the Confederacy, an Israeli nonprofit is seeking a...

Only Nuclear-Qualified, Navy Veteran, Transgender Rabbi in U.S. isn’t Happy

by JTA | Jul 28, 2017 | Commentary, News

By Anna Selman WASHINGTON, D.C. (JTA) — On Wednesday, in our offices near this city’s Dupont Circle, the staff at Jewish War Veterans of the U.S.A. were opening the mail when a request came in from a veteran asking that we change her first name on our records from...

Alan Gross, After 5 Years in Cuban Prison, Starting Over in Israel

by Ron Kampeas, JTA | Jul 13, 2017 | Commentary, International, Israel, Maryland, News

WASHINGTON (JTA) — Alan Gross contacted me a couple of months ago over Facebook Messenger. There was something he thought I should know. I was pleasantly surprised. I’d only exchanged pleasantries with Gross in the several times I’d seen him since...

Baltimore and Race, Two Years After Freddie Gray

by Staff Report | Mar 31, 2017 | Baltimore, Columns, Commentary, Local, Maryland, National, News

It’s hard to believe that it’s already been two years since the death of Freddie Gray, a 25-year-old African-American resident of Baltimore who died in police custody, and the subsequent protests and riots that stunned the city and nation. On April 12, 2015, Baltimore...

We’re Not The Only Ones, Folks

by Michael Olesker | Jan 31, 2017 | Columns, Commentary, OP/ED

I always thought my Jews cornered the market on excessive worrying, but maybe I’m mistaken. There’s evidence that the gentiles are catching up. Mazel tov to us both. It’s undeniable the Jews major in angst — it’s part of our history and DNA. But I’m talking here about...

Was Obama Good or Bad for the Jews?

by Neil Rubin, Ph.D. | Jan 31, 2017 | Commentary, National Politics, News, OP/ED, Politics

As Barack Obama recently took that final presidential limo ride to the U.S. Capitol for the swearing-in of his successor, we already can look back on a legacy with American Jews that will be as complex as his tangles with Israeli Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu. If...

School’s Out: Advice for Millennials

by Dr. Elliot D. Lasson | Jan 3, 2017 | Commentary, Opinion

In today’s workplace, there is a confluence of professionals coming from different backgrounds, experiences and generations. Perhaps the most talked about group is the Millennials. Sometimes referred to as “Generation Y,” Millennials are the first “digitally native”...

Make Baltimore Great Again?

by Rabbi Daniel Cotzin Burg | Nov 29, 2016 | Commentary, Community, Spirituality

A century ago, Reservoir Hill (though it was called something else) was the crown jewel of Baltimore’s Jewish community. The Whitelock Urban Farm sits on land that once housed sundry Jewish-owned businesses – a humming commercial hub bounded by dozens of Jewish...

Why Officiation Matters

by Fern Chertok and Leonard Saxe | Nov 29, 2016 | Commentary, News

At a summit held recently at the National Museum of American Jewish History in Philadelphia, several hundred communal professionals, rabbis, scholars, philanthropists and young intermarried couples gathered to discuss engagement of interfaith families in Jewish life....